Test Talk Glossary

This Test Talk Glossary provides definitions for terminology Sente uses in delivering a more comprehensive, effective approach than solutions that are typically referred to as "enterprise asset management" or "test equipment management."

Accountability practices: Practices that measure and provide closed loop feedback regarding the compliance of practitioners, users, and managers to TRM processes. These practices are foundational to shifting the ineffective behaviors (such as hoarding) required to produce breakthrough results.

Capital structures: Structures that all businesses use to create wealth for the enterprise. Of particular focus for Sente are our customers' equipment capital, human capital, operating capital, financial capital and capital budgets. Through effective management of an enterprise's capital structures in test/technology, test functions can be made more effective, freeing up "test capital structures" to be transformed and leveraged more strategically for the enterprise.

Change management: The common description given to the set of practices used by many companies to reduce the risk of failure of a project that requires new practices to be adopted to be successful.

Consoles: A unique capability used across the Scireo platform and used to organize data for analysis and trends, drill into details to understand issues driving the trends and then trigger integrated workflows to resolve the issues.

Governance Board: A cross-functional group of executives and invited guests who meet on a regular basis to establish goals, manage performance and help remove barriers to change. The board always includes the functional executive where the processes are installed (engineering or manufacturing) and appropriate financial executives or representatives.

Governance Practices: The set of practices used to translate enterprise objectives into actionable and measurable objectives that can be actively managed. Governance practices establish behaviors, aligned with company core values, that establish proper mind-sets and cultural orientation to achieve team objectives.

Hoarding: A practice used by equipment users to ensure they have the availability of equipment when they need it. It's often the most effective strategy for users to meet schedule deadlines and avoid performance penalties. Users hoard small devices (by squirreling them away in a corner no one else knows about) and big devices (large monument size, fixed test equipment) by scheduling themselves on a larger fixed asset just-in-case. Hoarded causes increased costs, reduced responsiveness, and slower processes.

Holistic approach: One that is whole and complete along multiple different continuums. TRM is holistic from a process perspective because it is a "womb to tomb" solution caring for test infrastructure from initial plans through acquisition, use, service, and disposal. It’s also holistic from an asset perspective because it includes ALL test assets – large "monument" test assets; general-purpose re-deployable assets; and software and project-specific assets like cables, break-out boxes, and fixtures. Finally, TRM is holistic in its overall approach because it intelligently connects processes, people, data and equipment components. Our implementation methods interpret cultural barriers, while sequencing solution components that overcome those barriers and drive measurable cost reductions.

Instrumented Processes: It means we are able to measure performance, generally of a process to know how long, how many, how much, etc. Instrumentation of processes provides a baseline and hard-facts from which to make decisions without emotion about where to invest for speed and cost competitiveness.

Integrated Systems and Processes: Capabilities that enable sharing of data and coordination of workflows between functions that generally have their own system or spreadsheet that doesn't "talk" to other systems or spreadsheets. These include property management systems, enterprise asset management systems (EAM), computerized maintenance management systems (CMMS), project management systems, work-order systems, scheduling systems, and knowledge management systems - to name a few. System integration enables not only the networking of software tools but with it the networking of organizations and teams in a way that makes them resilient, responsive and collaborative instead of fragile, reactive and isolated.

Scireo: The name of Sente's resource management software platform which comes from the Latin root "sci", to know, and from the root origin "scire". Scireo knows. It knows about your people, processes, data, and equipment and it knows how to organize them for speed and competitiveness.

Test organization/environment: The complex web of people, tools, practices, and data that drives the execution of mission-critical product testing functions. In many companies, this area represents an untapped source for dramatic improvements in profitability, time-to-market, engineering productivity, and manufacturing throughput.

Total-cost-of-ownership (TCO): A financial model that produces an accounting of the efficiency improvements made to the capital structures in test and their Pro-forma impacts on an enterprise's balance sheet and income statement.

Transformation Leadership: The process of modifying tools, practices, cultural mindsets and strategic intentions that enable competition at competitive standards. Transformation practices are in the DNA of our solutions including proven implementation strategies backed up by the practices that make them successful – such as rigorous Communication Plans, Accountability Practices, Real-Time Operational, Technical and Financial Metrics and focused Training Regimens.

TRM™: Test Resource Management: More than a software solution, TRM encompasses the complete set of practices, software tools and expertise Sente uses to optimize the capital structures dedicated by an enterprise to the fulfillment of their obligations in test.

Utilization:A measurement of the effective use of capital equipment and human capital.